An AV and integration-focused podcast broadcast weekly

This week's episode of Automation Unplugged is a special one. Ron is joined by Tom Doherty, a returning guest on AU. He’s the Director of New Technology Initiatives at HTSA, Creator of Lightapalooza, and a true industry veteran with more than 40 years in consumer electronics.

 

About this episode:

Ron and Tom discuss:

• What's new at Lightapalooza 2026 in Austin, TX: Education and certifications, education tracks and speakers, show floor exhibitors, and more
• Plus: How to save 25% on conference registration

SEE ALSO: #339: People, Culture, and Hiring — Building Teams That Last 

Transcript

Ron:

Hello. Hello there. Ron Callis with another episode of Automation Unplugged and we've got a special show today. We're coming out, what is it? Today's, gonna be Wednesday, January 21st, actually recording this show this week. So it's gonna be very much real time, and that is because I want to make sure all of you know about the awesome show that's coming up just around the corner in February. And that is the Lightapalooza show. And One Firefly has been very happy and excited to attend this event for multiple years now, actually, both with the One Firefly brand and Amplify people, our hiring services brand. And it's been a wonderful conference for us. So I wanted to bring Tom Doherty, he's the showrunner, the man behind Lightapalooza. Bring him on here, find out what's new. Find out maybe if you've been in the past, what can people expect that's gonna be different, as well as, if you've never attended, why might you wanna consider. So we're gonna keep the show today fast and moving, maybe a little bit shorter than a normal full interview that you're used to whenI'm here interviewing our guests, but Tom Doherty, he is, he has been on Automation Unplugged many times in the past. Super excited to have him back here, for show 340 and let's go ahead and bring him in and let's see. See what's new with Lightapalooza. Tom, how are you sir?

Tom:

I'm great. Thanks for, thanks for having me today.

Ron:

Ha, good morning. How are things there at home base for you?

Tom:

Things are wonderful. I'm here in Palm Desert, California. The weather's, really nice and, looking forward to, 2026 has started off well and I’m excited about this year.

Ron:

Today here in South Florida in Fort Lauderdale, it's unusually cold. It was in the forties this morning. And so I have to tell you, Tom, maybe you know this, but maybe some of our listeners do not. What happens in Florida when it dips into the forties? Is our iguanas cannot handle it.

Tom:

Mm.

Ron:

So I was on my morning walk, not my morning walk, my morning run. I ran a 5K this morning. And, it's a little sad and a little funny because all the iguanas, which can get very large fall out of the trees. So I'm running on the path around my neighborhood and there are just large iguanas. Randomly laying around on the ground and on the sidewalk. They're not dead. They're just in a coma. Because of the cold weather. They're full blooded creatures. They can't move. And it's just the oddest, surreal thing to see a bunch of random, large lizards laying every, I mean, when I say large, like you can get really large iguanas. Have you ever seen that or heard that?

Tom:

I've not seen that. I can believe that. There's something biblical about, you know raining toads. So, you're safe there.

Ron:

Raining iguanas, it happens like maybe once every year or two that it gets this cold to do this to the iguanas. It's pretty funny. Anyway, that's not why people are here. I want to talk about Lightapalooza. At a high level, maybe for people listening that have never attended Lightapalooza. What is Lightapalooza?

Tom:

Well, Lightapalooza for the integration channel is about what's next, and so what next has been integrators adding lighting as an offering. Many have been at it for some time. This will be our fifth year, our fifth conference.

Ron:

And if you don't mind, let's cover like some of the dates as well. The dates. What, where is it? When is it? And then again, what is it?

Tom:

February 16th through the 19th. So, Monday through Thursday really kind of kicks off, Monday afternoon with some certification courses, and then continues through Thursday with the exhibit floor opened on Tuesday and Wednesday. And then Thursday is a full day of education. It's taking place in the Kalahari Resort. On the outskirts of Austin, Texas, the suburbs of Austin, Texas, Round Rock. Really kind of a new exciting venue. We're really happy with it and looking forward to it. Who it's for, it's really for, primarily it's focused on integrators, all segments of an organization, of an integration company, ownership, sales, the technical project, managing operations and such. It has been popular with independent reps because lighting fixtures and lighting design and lighting category offering is a new category. Reps have found it wonderful because they've been able to attend education. Typically when they attend a trade show, they don't have time to attend education.

Ron:

They have to work the floor at the show.

Tom:

They have do that, the floor, they have to attend national sales manager meetings and, and some manufacturers have taken advantage of having meetings on Monday, pre pre-event. It's been good for that. And then there's a lot of curiosity. There's a lot of manufacturers that are not exhibiting, but are very curious about the channel and have attended and are looking at it. And then there are manufacturers in our space that are not lighting manufacturers, but like to be there because the most progressive integrators in the channel attend. So they wanna have that bar time or that restaurant time with the folks, even though they might not manufacture anything related to lighting.

Ron:

That's been our experience, I can say as a service company providing, you know, marketing services at One Firefly and hiring and Amplify People, you know, for us at a show, right? It's part of our marketing budget to be at an event like Lightapalooza or at a buying group event or at a CEDIA or whatnot. And the last two to three years Lightapalooza for us has been fascinating 'cause it's actually been one of our best events of the year on the calendar. And then you say, well, how do you attribute that? Because it's obviously a smaller show than a CEDIA right there, there's less humans at the Lightapalooza event. But you just said it's the progressive, I don't know. It's the top of the food chain that seems to be, at least from my perspective and my team when we're interacting with people there. People that are at the event are very much forward thinking. Often leaders, although there's other members of the team there as well, if they're attending say, different classes or education. And it's just every conversation with everybody at that event is a conversation that matters. That's at least been our perspective. I'm curious, have you received, you know, feedback similar to that, maybe from some of the other manufacturers, at least on, from the show floor standpoint?

Tom:

Yeah, that's, yeah, exactly. That we survey. We sent out a survey to every attendee, and we've done so since the very first one. And you know, that kind of feedback encourages us, you know, to tailor the program primarily focused on forward thinking people. And, you know, as every year goes by, they want more. Thus, you know, we look for elevating the education and the presenters and so on and so forth. And then we have also a lot of manufacturers that, like I mentioned, that are not lighting manufacturers, but are very familiar to everyone in this space. That would, you know.

Ron:

Would like to be on the floor.

Tom:

Is there a way we can be there? How can we participate? We, you know, when are you gonna expand this to include all of it? And it's like, well we're focused on, you know, doing this well. And don't have any plans to do that right now. Although we did add power a couple years ago and some manufacturers.

Ron:

Now why did you do that? Why did you go from lighting and some service companies, but it's obviously 95% lighting to adding the category of power. Was that last year or the year before?

Tom:

Two. Two years ago.

Ron:

Two years ago.

Tom:

This'll be the third year. Well, so the, you know, the show is not just lighting fixtures from the beginning it was really, you know, lighting, adding lighting fixture sales is kind of the newest thing for an integrator. They've been doing lighting control for years. They've been doing decades and decades they've been doing motorized shades for natural light control. And so originally it's like, well, let's bring those three things together because those are categories that are growing so much, so that many integrators kind of have their organization align, where that's a department handling the lighting fixtures, handling the lighting control, handling the shades, and so on. You know, Lightapalooza is about what's next. And power is, and the idea being that lighting, when I started evangelizing that a little more vocally within the industry, when I got the platform of going to work for HTSA was the reason why you do this, is this allows you to get in front of projects sooner. Well, power is a real, is also a growing category and it's foundational and I believe at the time and, and absolutely do now that integrators that can understand power can master that narrative and can provide the design services. That will get them into projects even before lighting. I think that will get them in front of opportunities before the hole is dug, before the general contractor is hired. So this is all about the integrator elevating their capabilities, getting into projects sooner. You're able to do, the power developers or architects are gonna bring you on to understand that foundational aspect. And then once you're there. You're gonna then deliver the lighting design and the lighting specification, and then you're gonna do the audio video specification. So I felt that that was the reason to put that in there.

Ron:

By your estimate, Tom, what within this umbrella you're calling power. What, what's in that category called power? And then how many integrators across the, I'll say North America, does it apply to, does it apply to a hundred percent of dealers in all markets, USA and Canada, or is it, particular, you know, maybe California or Texas have an extra emphasis?

Tom:

It ultimately affects everybody. Alternate because you see the increase of the number of integrators that have added electrical capabilities. I mean, it's still small, just it's still small, but it is growing. So either integrators are organically, creating their own electrical departments to be able to either rough wire or do some element of it to acquiring electrical contractors and bringing that in.

Ron:

I see more and more of that.

Tom:

I know we are, we've seen more and more of that on the power side. People have been specifying, small number, in terms of percentage, but growing, Rosewater, Savant solutions or some sort of, not cobbled together, but brought together, you know, multiple hardware platforms that deliver some sort of solution. Whether it's just load shedding, smart panels, whether it is batteries, to solar integration. So it's smart breakers. Smart breakers, load shedding. Smart breakers. Smart panels. So, that is, you know, essentially integrators, deliver technology solutions to their customers. Yeah, in the beginning it was just distributed music systems and then it's arced all the way to where we are today. No one really expected, when I brought up the idea that you should add lighting fixtures in 2017, people thought I was insane.

Ron:

It might be, but it's okay. We all, we all need a little bit of insanity in our life.

Tom:

Yeah, so now it's the dominating highest growth category, and Lightapalooza is quite the, you know, evidence of that. And I believe power is the next, is the next thing, and it's already a thing for many integrators. But it's a very low percentage, but it's, it's a growing one and it's a growing category.

Ron:

I wanna share, if you don't mind, I wanna share the website just to have you and I, I'm gonna navigate around a little bit. I'd love you to, at a high level, you've talked about who should attend. Let's look at this through the angle. And, and for those that are listening, I'm sharing the Lightapalooza website, which is just lightapalooza.com. From an education standpoint, maybe if we could go through high level, what is the way you've approached education and panels, you know, give us a high level overview and then we'll zoom in and I'd love to know maybe what's different about education this year, 2026, from years past? So those that are evaluating, do I go or do I send my people this year? Why would they consider doing that from an education standpoint?

Tom:

Sure. So I thought you were gonna navigate through the thing.

Ron:

No, I'm gonna wait for you to direct me and then I'll click around. I don't know where you wanna go first, so I'll wait for you to talk about it.

Tom:

Yeah. So at a core level, the channel, the industry is bought into, hey, lighting is an important thing to be in. And when I first started to explain, you should do this, people would ask, well, what's the path? I said, well, you first want some education. You need to learn lighting fundamentals and so that you can have a narrative and you can demonstrate that you are as expert or more expert than everybody else on the project, which is not very hard to do. You're really talking about your client, the architect, the builder, the interior designer, and the electrician. So having lighting fundamentals gives you that confidence. Then you need to be able to bring into your showroom or have the capability to demonstrate lighting, the differences between what's average and what's possible. And then finally, because the client will be convinced, well, that makes sense. No one's shown that to me. What's the next step? Well, you need to have a deliverable. You need to say, well, we need to do a lighting design so we can lay out the lighting and specify the fixtures. And so that had been very successful in that many integrators were able to follow that path, get lighting fundamentals, education, fit out their showroom, come up with some way to deliver lighting design, whether organically or using somebody like Light Can Help You to provide that service. And so integrators were able to successfully sell fixtures, but then after they were doing that, some were profitable and some had a lot of pain. And what became clear is, is the real weakness, the real barrier to success is project managing lighting projects. Much harder than av, primarily because no one knows how to project manage lighting. And so we've added project management to this. We have Dennis Jaques, is probably the most expert on project managing lighting jobs. He developed, I contributed very little, but he and I, with his work, came up with a lighting project management handbook. It's a 188 page handbook. We've used it at HTSA to teach a course. And we're bringing Dennis to deliver three separate courses on lighting project management. And then of course we have Jason Sayen involved and he is teaching some project management techniques. So that, that is the weak link amongst most integrators is the project managing of lighting. So that is a new addition. We'll have the handbooks there that people can purchase. That's a new, exciting and really important element. The other part that's important to folks is business growth. There we have experts like yourself and others that we have a track just on, on business. I think it's titled, business growth for lighting and beyond. Additionally, Light Can Help You discover series. So this is something that WAC is sponsoring. There are I think nine separate one hour sessions within the Light Can Help You discover series and it's included in the basic pass. So no additional costs for these nine sessions. Really quite the range. They turned out to be very popular so far in the registration portal. Could jump around some more. You know, the other thing is that, like I mentioned, you know, there have been people that have attended Lightaplaooza all four previous, and so they're always wanting something new. I think the project management part of it is important.

Ron:

Just so I'm clear, Tom, multiple of those, is that entire project management set of courses new, or all the project new about that project management?

Tom:

All the project management courses are new.

Ron:

That alone is worth the price of admission. Particularly if you are working with the lighting fixture side of this in your business. There's probably a lot of bleeding margins

Tom:

A hundred percent.

Ron:

If the stories, and I've sat through one of Dennis's classes and I've heard Jason and Dennis speak and they talk about so many places in a business where they can be losing profitability if they aren't fully on top of the change orders and all the other chaos that can happen on a lighting project.

Tom:

There's one key metric that Dennis, and so all of you integrators that are watching this, this is how you can do an honest assessment on how successful you are. Everybody has a warehouse and most likely they have a lighting shelf of shame, and that is fixtures that didn't fit. Where the wrong ones were ordered incorrectly, fixtures, high-end specification fixtures are made to order. They typically can't be returned and so often be through poor project management, site visits, so on and so forth. Complete integration with your operations and accounting team and warehouse team. If you have a shelf of shame and it continues to grow, increase, that’s profit margin sitting on the shelf from the handbook and the courses.

Ron:

Yeah, that's, that's fair. High level again in the menu. Now I'm describing exactly what I'm seeing to the audience. I see it says SHINE certification. Can you just restate, or remind us what is SHINE certification and what they can expect to happen at Lightapalooza here in February 2026?

Tom:

Sure. SHINE is, stands for Specialists in Home Illumination, Natural Light and Energy Control. So it encompasses the four silos of lighting, lighting control, natural light control and power. So the four categories. And we offered, SHINE lighting fundamentals for the first time two conferences ago, and that is an eight hour course that includes an exam at the end. The first year we had 80 attendees 40 at a time take the course. It was offered twice last year. We had 120, 60 at a time, 60 at a time. Both years have sold out. This year, we're repeating that, but this year we've added lighting control protocol fundamentals. So, that is a four hour course that goes over lighting control, fundamental protocol fundamentals. So phase dimming. Forward in reverse, zero to 10 Dolly and DMX. So recently you can go to Lightapalooza LinkedIn page. I asked the question, how well do you know lighting control protocols? And we have a free assessment quiz with 20 questions and a lot of people have been taking it. It was posted just a few days ago. And, it's clear that the channel is weak on the DMX side and DMX is really something that needs to be understood because any kind of LED delivery with R-G-B-R-G-B-W and a lot of other, uh, tunable control protocols are gonna be through DMX. Because it's an industry standard. It's fast, it's robust. That is something that'll be covered in the lighting control protocol. SHINE courses offered twice, it's four hours in length. And then we also added, power fundamentals. So we have a SHINE power fundamentals I'll be posting on LinkedIn. Stay tuned for that, another assessment course. And that is also offered twice. A really great opportunity to send your people or yourself through either or all of those. And, we're excited about that. So that's what SHINE is.

Ron:

I love it. All right, so that's through, we went through the education tracks. I do wanna ask you about one of these. Can you tell us about, I'm looking at how many education tracks are there? There's nine.

Tom:

There are, there are nine.

Ron:

What is the academia series?

Tom:

So, th academia series, we introduced this last year and this was primarily aimed at the alumni, let's say, of Lightapalooza. People that have gone and have sat through, many people, multiple times, Peter Romano's lighting design, all of his lighting courses have been the most popular since the day one. And, but some are wanting, you know, even more so I reached out to universities and academia and recruited professors, PhD professors to come to Lightapalooza. They'd never heard of it. I told him what it was about and we were able to secure Dr. Craig Bernecker, lifetime achievement recipient from the IES. He is the head of New York's Parsons Design School in their lighting department. Also folks from the Icahn School of Medicine, Light and Health, from New York came and then we had, Dr. Kevin Houser, who amongst IALD, International Association of Lighting Designers, and top lighting designers around the country. You know, he's their, I don't wanna say hero, but they, he is top dog in terms of that. So, all three of them were here last year. In fact, Kevin Houser was the keynote and they were shocked, surprised, had never, didn't know about it, who an integrator was. I had obviously convinced them to come, but their takeaway was just joy, they just saw the hunger for knowledge and learning and enthusiasm of integrators in this new category. So they unanimously are coming back. They've changed their courses. There's different sessions. So there's no way for anybody in our channel to experience this level of education. Unless you spend tens of thousands of dollars going to these schools and so to sit in these courses. And so if you have a premium pass, they're included for free or you can buy these a la carte. Maybe you're not interested in all of these, but one of these courses sounds interesting. So, you know,we have top academia folks and Greg Barrett. A lot of folks know who Greg is. Greg was a student of Dr. Burner, and now is a, you know, has remained a leading voice within our channel. Recently has joined WAC. So that's news that people may have noticed. So we're really proud that Lightapalooza has got the credibility to bring in firepower like this. The industry that I, that you and I are part of, I'm not aware of that kind of firepower teaching anything, and that's the differentiator I think about Lightapalooza, is that there really aren't any integrators on our faculty kind of sharing what happens in panel discussions. But when it comes to real curriculum, you know, we have, you know, generally, you know, people top of their profession delivering it.

Ron:

Tom, let's maybe close out and talk a little bit about the floor, the show floor vendors. What types of vendors, maybe if you wanna name drop some of the vendors that are gonna be on the floor and is there, are there more vendors this year? Less vendors than, than in years past?

Tom:

We've maintained a curated show floor there. I, you know, I probably could have added, and I don't, I'm not exaggerating, I could have added 30 to 40 more lighting companies and I get inquiries multiple times a week. Hey, tell me about your show. I want to exhibit. And the criteria is focus, you know, making sure that that manufacturer, is either already committed or is kind of demonstrating that they're gonna take this channel seriously and that they're going to provide the services and the way of doing business that integrators are used to across all the other categories that, believe it or not, that's kind of a shift for lighting manufacturers. So there that is part of the criteria. So this year we have a little bit of growth. We are, 72, or last year, I think we were 63 or 62. I can't recall exactly, so a little bit of growth. Really all the usual suspects. There's a number of new smaller niche type of lighting fixture manufacturers that make some unique things that are not conflicting with many of the other folks. We have some new power people. We have a separate power pavilion, so they're all grouped together and in fact, those power companies have come together and they are on Tuesday having a kind of an exclusive agnostic five courses, about five and a half hours that'll be taught, and then they're having a little reception after show hours on that Tuesday. I don't know if this'll be controversial or not. I don't care.

Ron:

Is this said, did I, when I put you on the spot to set to name names.

Tom:

No, no, no, no, no, no. Not that at all. New kind of a, a little bit more bleed into a new category that I think is foundational. Oh. So last year, last year, we added Cleerline. So Cleerline is a fiber company. Well, why are they there, Tom? It's not because light goes through the fiber, is it? And no, it's because a lot of these big projects are on an estate where there's multiple buildings and interconnecting the lighting control is kind of foundational in having best practices using fiber.

Ron:

Processor to processor communication.

Tom:

Processor to processor communication, lightning hits, it doesn't take out the processors, and you have fast, robust communication for fast control of the lighting. We get a lot of pressure from all kinds of companies, speaker companies, video companies that wanna be at Lightapalooza because the most progressive integrators attend. So I've made a little bit of a leap in the networking side because I look at networking as foundational. It's not video, it's not audio. And so we have, we've added some network companies, so OneVision will be there, kind of like a service provider.

Ron:

It makes sense to have them there.

Tom:

That's right. And I've added and allowed access networks. And Ubiquiti. And Ubiquiti has, you know, both those companies are primarily networking companies, hardware companies, of course. So Access Networks is a strong player in that area. So that's a new thing. In terms of expanding there.

Ron:

I like it how you took my question. What are some of the brands there? And you managed to name drop some of the brands no one expected to be there. And you heard it here first, folks, breaking news on network companies are gonna be at Lightapalooza.

Tom:

Yeah. And the other, the other one just to show the seriousness, the integrators have been controversial to other groups taking on lighting, and I'm referring to professional lighting designers. A lot of professional lighting designers have not been welcoming that integrators a lot of at the time is because they're offended that some integrators take some classes and now say that they are lighting designers, which is fair. But you know, not all custom builders are the same. Not all interior designers are the same.

Ron:

Right.

Tom:

There's no licensing for lighting designer. Most of it is experience. But last year we had two of the most respected lighting designers attend, Thomas Patterson and Sean O'Connor. They were impressed that we brought the academia in and then them being there, they were surprised and primarily positive about Ligthapalooza. They also recognize that not every integrator is at the same level and some are very accomplished at doing this. But what's exciting this year is there is, I mentioned the IALD, so the IALD, International Association of Lighting Designers. Highly respected organization. They're gonna be on the show floor and their executive director's gonna be there, because they've made a change in their bylaws or their governance or something. I might not have that correct, but they now have a tier where integrators can join the IALD and have some affiliation with it and can utilize their resources. My whole thing about all of this, bringing in academia, inviting the IALD is that, I just wanna continue to elevate integrators and what's possible and then increase awareness amongst the whole community, of integrators’ ability to enhance their clients' lives, which we've been doing for decades.

Ron:

Yeah.

Tom:

In every category that we add, we are so integrated into homeowners’ lives. We're integrated into homeowners’ lives more than any profession. Almost every other profession does some work with the client and then is gone. They might have some friendships, but we are intimately involved in their home. All the technology. With their families, servicing them, upgrading them, and continuing to bring technologies to them. And what we've done with lighting, I, it has just further reinforced because now we're having an impact on their living space visually and emotionally. We've been doing that visually and emotionally with home theater and with distributed music systems. But this is a whole other element of architectural design.

Ron:

Tom, let's close out with, first of all, what I'm visually on, I'm on the pass page of the website, which is lightapalooza.com. What if you were to, at a very high level, strongly recommend integrators listening or watching this, this interview right now to attend. What would be your, your closing argument, if you will, as to why they should attend? What would be their primary takeaway?

Tom:

You know, there are, there are three elements to this. I mean, one is the education, you know, the differentiator of the best integration companies is how well you, you and your team are trained, and there just isn't a better event within our industry, related to education. And it's not just lighting, it's all the things business, so on and so forth. The other part of it is clear that to be able to efficiently engage with the range of manufacturers, all of which are gonna have their principals there, their top team, it being small, you know, the attendance is not overwhelming. You're able to have quality conversations with these manufacturers and they are bringing their latest stuff to this event. They now are targeting the launch of new products and new technologies at this event. And then finally, you know, the biggest value of any kind of conference is the, you know, the engagement with fellow peers and also in this kind of intimate environment. You, you know, the most progressive people here. I mean, yeah, people come to this thing at the end of the night or the end of the day. They're gonna be at the bar, but they're having conversations and to be able to engage with your peers, you know, there's nothing more valuable. So, you know, businessman to businessman, business person to business person. However, so it’s three things. And, you know, when we survey, the feedback is that, you know, this event is like the earliest days of CEDIA. You know, this is, the energy. It's not a high school reunion. This is like excitement, new stuff. And you know, I learn as much outside the class as I do in the class. So those three things,

Ron:

By the numbers, you've got around 72, 73 vendors on the floor, courses. I had gathered this from you in advance time, so if this is not accurate, correct me, but, 149 hours of education in the courses. You got over 102 plus classroom or classes that involve, you know, the academia content, the various tracks, the manufacturer courses and the panels. So 102 different sessions. It's gonna be an action packed event. And you were kind enough for those that did listen to this or watch this, to give people a discount code if they wanna register. Now, if they have not registered, I'm gonna put it on the screen, but, through the checkout process, if they sign up to attend, and there's various, maybe Tom, if you want to describe the pass types. There's various pass types, but you're, if they punch in AU, that stands for Automation Unplugged, folks. AU340. This is show 340. You wanna mention Tom, what you're gonna offer people that punch them in the checkout process?

Tom:

Yeah. When they check out, they'll get 25% off the total cost. That's 25% off whatever pass they select, 25% off the SHINE courses, 25% off of any a la carte courses they might purchase if they only purchase the Essentials Pass. And then the website clearly describes what's included with the Essentials Pass, what's included with the Premium Pass. So 25% off real money.

Ron:

Essential Pass, is listed on the site as $200. The Premium Pass, $650. And by the way, folks, I'm noticing the subtext on the website. Prices go up on February 1st.

Tom:

Correct.

Ron:

So if you want to get the biggest bang for your buck, register now at the current January pricing, and then activate the AU340 code and get 25% off that. There's also an education, a la carte. So how does that work, Tom? People per course, they can just sign up for a particular class if they want?

Tom:

Yeah.

Ron:

Okay. That makes sense. Well, Tom, thank you for joining me, for this special episode of Automation Unplugged. It's a pleasure as always, to see you. And I'll see you in person here in a matter of weeks at the event. Thank you so much.

Tom:

Thank you, Ron. Have a good day.

Ron:

You too.

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Ron Callis is the CEO of One Firefly, LLC, a digital marketing agency based out of South Florida and creator of Automation Unplugged. Founded in 2007, One Firefly has quickly became the leading marketing firm specializing in the integrated technology and security space. The One Firefly team work hard to create innovative solutions to help Integrators boost their online presence, such as the elite website solution, Mercury Pro.

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Resources and links from the interview:

• • Lightapalooza Website

• • Lightapalooza LinkedIn